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[Ko = togetherness. Linda = beautiful. Colinda = ajoins. Colindante = a neighbour with a shared border. By some stretch of the imagination, Kolinda could be thought of as a seam, the joining of diverse worlds.]

Komunidad Kolinda is an intentional eco-community in the Sierra Sur of Oaxaca in southern Mexico. We are located at an altitude of 2500m in a mixed pine oak forest on a beautiful piece of land with three streams, various waterfalls, amazing views and the constant song of birds.

We are currently three families from Mexico and Europe; five adults and six kids. Our aim is to live harmoniously and regeneratively on our 6.5 hectares of land and create a space where our kids can grow and where people can come together in nature, eat from the land, learn new skills and find peace of mind.

The land is co-owned in equal shares by all permanent members and we organize horizontally and through consensus-based decision-making. Permanent members enter or leave in a process that values community over money. While we carry out business activities on the land, this happens in a manner that does not negatively impact the sense of community, sharing and togetherness.

The community was founded in 2018 and, as of 2021, we are still in the process of moving onto the land. We are building three private houses and a communal workshop, mostly out of clay, wood and other natural materials. We have a tipi, an outdoor communal kitchen, lots of fruit trees, terraced gardens, beautiful camping spaces, a wood-fired hot tub by a mountain creek and, more often than not, a small pack of volunteers from all over the world making pizzas in our clay oven and getting their hands dirty on our building projects and in the gardens.

We envision several heart-projects for the social and ecological benefit of this indigenous region, including a House of Healing & Traditional Medicine, and a large-scale forest regeneration project. Our connection to and co-operation with our Zapotec friends and neighbours are of the utmost importance.

We are conscientous stewards of our land working on the creation of an abundant food forest combining both local heritage species with plants never before grown in our area. Through the intelligent management of water, biomass creation, companion planting, the fostering of biodiversity in all kingdoms of life, mushroom cultivation and other techniques we aim to regenarate soils and  invite rare plant and animal species back to our land all while creating a delicious and nourishing environment for all species to spend time in.

Within the group of permanent members you will find a handful of professional artists, including musicians, a recording artist / filmmaker / producer / voiceover artist, a dancer, a photographer and a clothes designer. The potential for artistic endeavors in Kolinda is infinite – we want to hold space for creativity in all its forms. We will build a recording studio / sound temple, reserve a space in the communal workshop for art, create a forest dance floor and stage for ecstatic dance and other events, build sound stages with resonant domes in aurally beautiful spots in nature, use the gorgeous land as a film set…

Once we live on the land we envision an active community life where we host workshops with teachers instructing in permaculture, yoga, natural building, music, art and anything else desired; where we host meditation and nature retreats and where healers perform plant medicine ceremonies and we sing the songs of our hearts.

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Within Komunidad Kolinda, we are an experiment to discover and implement regenerative, sustainable and harmonious ecological, social and economical living-solutions.

Within our bio-region and cultural environment, we see ourselves as a channel for projects for the benefit of the indigenous population and the ecology of these mountains.

On a planetary level, we consider ourselves part of the wave of alternative communities that together can change human consciousness and challenge mainstream ideas of how human
societies operate – as such, we are a demonstration site and hopefully a source of inspiration for the myriads of people who can sense the wrongness of the modern world but lack the hope, imagination and skills to join the co-creation of a better future.

We are members of the Global Ecovillage Network and we do want to play our part in the creation of a viable ecologically and socially sustainable alternative future for the planet. We are one.